AMSTERDAM, 20 December 2019, 12:00 CET – Avantium, a leading technology company in renewable chemistry, announces that today Mr. Edwin Moses has been appointed as Chairman of Avantium’s Supervisory Board.
Tom van Aken is Avantium’s CEO (Chief Executive Officer) and member of the Management Board. Before his appointment as a CEO in 2005 he was Vice President of Business Development (2002-2004) and Vice President of Global Marketing and Sales (2004-2005).
Prior to joining Avantium, Tom was Business Development Director at DSM Fine Chemicals, Inc.
Dutch native, Tom earned an MSc in Chemistry from the University of Utrecht.
Tom’s main inspiration is the excellent team he works with and the opportunity to make an impact together.
Sustainable Development Goals
This target requires us to call for greater action on the need for a fossil-free chemical industry. We will be advocating for changes that support the transition to circular chemicals and materials. We want to lead by example, and we are demanding from ourselves to step up to address the climate crisis. The scale of the challenge demands that we more actively engage and work through partnerships and collaborations with a broad range of stakeholders.
Sustainable Development Goals
As part of our diversity agenda, we believe in gender equality and will strive to achieve this at Avantium. In 2019, 29% of Avantium’s Management Team, 25% of our Leadership Teams and 33% of our Supervisory Board were women. The chemical industry is currently underrepresented by women across all levels of organisations. Avantium compares favourably against the industry average but we know that there is still a lot to do across all levels of the company to achieve gender parity and equality.
Sustainable Development Goals
Our approach to inspire the next generation of scientists focuses on three actions:
Sustainable Development Goals
We aim to continuously improve our work environment and culture. We strive to maintain a flat organisation that empowers, recognises and celebrates the many cultures represented. We do this is by making sure we all live and breathe the Avantium values. These values act as our compass and ensure that we are a purpose driven organisation embracing sustainability, wellbeing, diversity and inclusion.
Perform a ‘Great Place to Work’ baseline assessment of workplace to be able to:
Sustainable Development Goals
We already have a strong safety culture and focus heavily on Health and Safety. We will now begin to embed safety into our systems. We will do this by rolling out ISO45001 across our operations as the gold standard for organisations who are serious about improving employee safety, reducing workplace risks and creating better and safer working conditions.
Sustainable Development Goals
We will do this by:
Sustainable Development Goals
In order to achieve zero carbon operations, we will focus on the following areas:
We will:
Sustainable Development Goals
In order to ensure the integrity of our feedstocks, we aim to only partner with suppliers that actively engage in sustainable practices. We will strive to adopt independently certified sustainable standards of feedstock, but when these are not available or appropriate, we will create our own sustainability standards in consultation with subject matter experts and leading NGOs.
Sustainable Development Goals
Avantium will tackle the circularity challenge with the following approach:
Sustainable Development Goals
Avantium’s technologies will deliver CO2 savings through:
Trudy Schoolenberg joined the Supervisory Board of the Company in September 2020.
Dr. Trudy Schoolenberg served in various senior management positions at Shell, Wärtsilä and Akzo-Nobel in Research, Operations and Strategy. Dr. Schoolenberg currently holds Senior Independent Director roles at Spirax Sarco Engineering Plc, and Accsys Technologies Plc. Additionally, she is a Non-Eexecutive Director (Bestuurslid) of The Netherlands Petroleum Stockpiling Agency (COVA).
Dr. Schoolenberg has a Ph.D. in Technical Sciences at the Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands) and an Msc in Industrial Engineering. She certified as a Non Execitive Director at ESAA, Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Cynthia Arnold joined the Supervisory Board of the Company in September 2020.
She served as Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at The Valspar Corporation, a manufacturer of paint and coatings. She was also Chief Technology Officer at Sun Chemical Corporation, the world’s largest producer of printing inks and pigments. Prior to this, she worked for nine years at General Electric Plastics, of which three years were for GE Plastics Europe in The Netherlands. She currently serves as a non-executive Director on the Boards of The Cabot Corporation, Milliken & Company and Citrine Informatics.
Dr. Cynthia Arnold holds a Ph.D. from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University in Blacksburg (USA), an MBA from the University of California in Berkeley (USA) and a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of California in Berkely (USA).